Abstract:

Living a good human life depends on two criteria: first, the development of the capacities required to engage in characteristic human actions, actions without which a life could not be happy or, indeed, fully human; and, second, the political circumstances that permit and promote the exercise of those capacities in a free and just way. It is too often forgotten that education can promote the capacities required to live well; it is not merely professional training, which, alone, would be wholly insufficient. Education is required to arm citizens with the capacities they need to fulfill their roles in political society, which, if the society is good, will promote citizens’ abilities to live well. Proper education is a common requirement for the achievement of both criteria for a good life. This indicates that the success of an educational system at promoting these capacities is a necessary, though not sufficient, condition for the ability of political society to achieve what Aristotle says is its telos, its end, of promoting good lives for its people. Political society can be evaluated by how successfully an educational system promotes individuals’ capacities to live well, not just by its success at protecting individual rights. I refer to the criteria that an educational system must meet to promote the capacities individuals need to live well, which determine whether or not a political society can be successful, as the “eudaimonic pedagogical requirement.” The eudaimonic pedagogical requirement stipulates that a good education will cultivate basic human capacities by teaching knowledge of facts; intellectual, civic, and moral virtues; deliberative skills; and will do so in a way that promotes freedom rather than domination, using a formal education system, laws, and society’s basic structures. The eudaimonic pedagogical requirement serves as a measuring stick for the success of education and modern liberal democracies.